What people are saying:

• Facebook User: I’m torn between a laughing emoji and an angry emoji 😳
• Facebook User: Their education in PUBLIC SCHOOL… If parents want their children to learn this, then home, church, or parochial school is the place.
  The agenda of Lifewise is to undermine public education, not just teach Christian evangelical religion.
• Facebook User: Thanks for sharing Neil. I’m glad there is a Secular Education Association to counteract faith based nonsense.
• Facebook User: For me, science class in my Christian elementary school was just another Bible lesson. I remember one lesson was about how God decided the weather. Another was how the devil set out dinosaur bones to test our faith.
• Facebook User: Where does it say that in the Bible?
• Facebook User: They’re trying to get a foothold in our local district. Fortunately they have little support so far.
  • Facebook User: Facebook User starve em out. Without a product or support they fail.
  • Facebook User: Facebook User they had 35 signatures on their parental interest form when I looked it up last. We’re in a blue city that leans into the religious freedom part of things.
    My kid knows he’s allowed to refuse to attend their “classes” and to call me if he’s forced to (if they get a toe in the door).
  • Facebook User: Facebook User sent a message
• Facebook User: Genesis 2:5–6 clearly states that God had not caused it to rain and that a mist rose from the earth to water the ground. Now, it doesn’t specifically say that continued until Noah, but it’s certainly a biblical basis for that interpretation. And just because the earth operates a certain way today doesn’t mean conditions have always been identical. But I guess mocking the Bible is easier than actually considering what it says. 🙄
  • Facebook User: Facebook User science tells us there was rain on earth beforehand. We don’t need a Bible to understand that. Not everyone believes in God or the Bible stories.
  • Secular Education Association: Facebook User You literally just confirmed the point of our post. 😂

    “It doesn’t specifically say that continued until Noah.”

    EXACTLY. IT DOESN’T.

    Yet LifeWise is teaching elementary school children that it didn’t rain until Noah’s flood.

    You’re defending a claim that you acknowledge the Bible doesn’t actually make, then accusing US of mocking scripture for pointing that out. We’re not mocking the Bible. We’re questioning LifeWise’s curriculum. And you’ve just demonstrated exactly why that scrutiny is necessary. 🙄

  • Facebook User: Facebook User so the water cycle (created by God) is in place but He didn’t specifically make it rain. It still doesn’t mean that it didn’t rain! We have had spectacular rain and floods in the past few years all not caused by God (but by the water cycle) because He promised not to. The lesson can still be that Noah had faith in God and we need to especially when we can’t see our way through a crisis. The Lifewise lesson is not about faith, it’s about mistrusting science and about creating fear in children so they are scared into obedience.
  • Facebook User: Secular Education Association no, i’m not. I’m literally agreeing with lifewise, because you’re the one who says lifewise is teaching them that it doesn’t rain…. Which is biblically accurate.
    Genesis 2:5 clearly says God had NOT caused it to rain, and Genesis 2:6 says a mist came UP FROM THE EARTH to water the ground. Last I checked, mist rising from the ground and rain falling from the sky aren’t the same thing. So yes, there is a biblical foundation for what LifeWise is teaching. Does Scripture specifically say when that changed? No. But that doesn’t make the interpretation baseless. Funny how quickly you dismiss Scripture while claiming to understand what it says. 🙄
  • Facebook User: Good for you! If you don’t believe in the Bible, that’s your choice and luckily we live in a country that allows uf the freedom of religion! . And thankfully, your children don’t have to attend LifeWise. Its a VOLUNTARY program with parental permission- they cannot just scoop your child away to LifeWise.
    . As for science, put ten scientists in a room and you can end up with eight different theories. Science is constantly evolving, and what scientists believe today may change tomorrow. I’m going to put my faith in what the Bible teaches. You’re free to believe otherwise. Just as I am. So what exactly is your point? That because YOU don’t believe in the Bible, other parents shouldn’t have the right to choose biblical education for their children? 🙄
  • Facebook User: Facebook User Penny, Genesis 2:5 specifically says God had NOT caused it to rain, and verse 6 explains how the earth was watered instead. You’re right that it doesn’t explicitly say when that changed, but that doesn’t make the interpretation unreasonable. And God’s promise to Noah was never that there wouldn’t be another flood. It was that He would never again destroy the entire earth by a flood (Genesis 9:11). There’s a pretty big difference. Just because we understand how the water cycle works today doesn’t mean we know every detail of how God originally created and sustained the earth.
  • Facebook User: Facebook User Ummm…no. People here aren’t mocking the Bible. Most people would cut the creators and recorders of Bronze Age myths a lot of slack for trying to explain things they couldn’t possibly know the actual answer to.

    So it’s not a book or a myth that’s being mocked. It’s you. It’s people like you that pretend observable reality isn’t real to fit a religious dogma that can’t possibly be true is what is mocked.

  • Facebook User: Facebook User David, thank you for proving my point. You claim nobody is mocking the Bible, then immediately refer to it as “Bronze Age myths” and proceed to insult people who believe in it. Apparently, your definition of respectful discussion is mocking anyone whose faith differs from yours. I haven’t denied observable reality. I’ve simply pointed out what Scripture says and how Christians interpret it. You don’t have to believe in God, but your disbelief
  • Secular Education Association: Facebook User You have every right to teach your children whatever religious beliefs you choose. What you DON’T have is the right to expect public schools to accommodate religious instruction at the expense of the school day without scrutiny or criticism. And science changing in response to new evidence isn’t a weakness. That’s literally how science works. 💁‍♀️

    Your religious freedom doesn’t exempt LifeWise from accountability, and your parental choice doesn’t erase the rights of every other child in that school.

  • Facebook User: Facebook User The Flood story originated in the Bronze Age, in the Levant. It predates the existence of the proto-Israelites. It’s a myth. It was recorded by the Biblical authors in the Early Iron Age. The events in the story didn’t happen. They could not have happened. To think they did is a denial of reality.

    Literal interpretation of myths does a disservice to both the myth and the religion of which they are a part of.

  • Facebook User: Secular Education Association Exactly! And, one has to believe a literal interpretation of the Bible, translated over many centuries in at least 4 different languages, written by men in ancient times, much of the “modern” content initially determined in Rome with Constantine and the Nicean Council with a distinct political agenda.
  • Facebook User: Facebook User accepting mythology without question is easier than science 😀
  • Facebook User: Facebook User when science “evolves” that means it learned and discovered more knowledge. Not that it was wrong.
  • Zachary Parrish: Facebook User you’re quoting a verse that is referencing pre-creation…it’s describing the state of the world before Adam was made. To think every living thing survived for over 1600 years after that with no rain is nothing less than willfully ignorant and interpretive.

    Context matters, even for make believe stories.

  • Facebook User: Funny you should bring up religious freedom, because it works BOTH ways. You have every right not to believe in God, not to teach your children the Bible, and not to enroll them in LifeWise. I have those exact same freedoms to believe in God, teach my children Scripture, and choose LifeWise for them. Your religious freedom doesn’t somehow outweigh mine just because you disagree with my beliefs. And please explain exactly which rights of other children are being violated by a voluntary program they aren’t required to attend. Nobody is asking to be exempt from accountability. you need to recognize the same freedom of choice you expect for yourself. Religious freedom isn’t just freedom FROM religion. It’s also freedom TO practice it. You don’t get to champion one while trying to restrict the other. 🙄
  • Facebook User: Facebook User The Bible describes the world as being flat, as being covered by a dome, and having the sun revolve around it.
  • Facebook User: Facebook User Exactly, Chris! Ty! That’s the whole point. Science changes as new evidence and discoveries emerge. That’s how we gain knowledge, but it also means our understanding isn’t always complete. What scientists believed hundreds of years ago isn’t necessarily what they believe today, and what we believe today may change with future discoveries. Yet some people act as though our current understanding answers every question about how the earth operated thousands of years ago. I have no problem with science, but I also have no problem putting my faith in Scripture. The two don’t have to be enemies just because some people insist on making them that way.
  • Facebook User: Facebook User Zachary, you’re right about one thing: context matters. Genesis 2:5–6 describes a time when God had not caused it to rain and the ground was watered by mist. I’ve never claimed the passage explicitly says those conditions continued for 1,600 years. I’m saying there’s a biblical basis for that interpretation. You can disagree without pretending the Scripture doesn’t exist. And calling the Bible “make-believe stories” while lecturing Christians about context and ignorance is rather ironic. If your argument is so convincing, you shouldn’t need insults to support it. 🙄
  • Zachary Parrish: Facebook User and which verse is it that says dinosaurs were on the ark? Do you believe every word in the Bible literal and true? Cause it sure seems like there’s an awful lot of interpretation going on.

    After the fall Adam is told to harvest his food from the ground through painful toil and that he must eat the plants of the field.

    Cain is described as a cultivator or tiller of the ground.

    Why are we skipping over these references? Was plant life just being sustained magically with no rain? Maybe they had really really good irrigation systems.

  • Facebook User: Facebook User Zachary, first of all, where did I ever claim dinosaurs were on Noah’s ark? Do I believe they were? No, I don’t. There have been countless species of animals throughout history that are now extinct, and probably many we’ve never even discovered. The Bible doesn’t give us a complete list of every animal that existed or exactly when each species lived, so I’m not going to pretend to know.

    Now, as for your argument about Adam and Cain growing crops, you do realize plants need moisture, not necessarily rain falling from the sky, right? Humidity, mist, dew, and condensation can all provide water to vegetation. Genesis 2:6 specifically tells us that mist rose from the earth and watered the ground. It doesn’t tell us how often that happened or how much moisture it provided, but it clearly tells us it happened. So growing crops doesn’t automatically prove rainfall occurred. I mean, plants in the desert live without rainfall for long periods of time…most desert plants store water in their roots or leaves. Plants dont need “rainfall” they need access to a water source. That could be damp fog, morning dew, or this “mist” that is spoken of. I use parentheses because it doesn’t describe in detail exactly what that is except it is a source or water for the ground.

    And for someone so concerned about biblical accuracy, you seem awfully determined to argue about things I never claimed. First dinosaurs, now apparently plants can’t survive without rain. Maybe try addressing what Scripture actually says instead of inventing arguments for me to defend. 🙄

  • Facebook User: Facebook User When do you decide what science to trust and what science to dismiss if it doesn’t align with a book written centuries ago? Do you fly on airplanes (gracious NO, the bible doesn’t even mention planes or cars)? Would you allow your child to get treatment for a heart condition, thyroid disorder, or seizures (please NO, the bible doesn’t mention those medicines at all – if god wanted your child to be healthy, he would have just built him that way)? I am assuming you are sending your Facebook posts directly through prayer, because surely you would not trust computers; they are not even mentioned in the bible (the magic of the Internet is surely some serious devil work)! It just sounds so silly.
  • Facebook User: Facebook User You will not put ten scientists in a room and have eight different opinions on evolution. Same for the heliocentric model, plate tectonics and the water cycle. There is such a thing as objective truth: that which is true whether one believes it or not. It can be argued that faith and science may coexist, but biblical literalism and scientific objective truth cannot.
    Secular Education Association
    Facebook User
  • Facebook User: Facebook User no one is mocking. You said yourself that that verse is vague and doesn’t support that it *never* rained between Adam and Noah. Could it be interpreted that way? Sure. Does that make it factual? Absolutely not.
  • Facebook User: Facebook User ohhh…you like the child abuse, the child sex trafficing and the incest?
    How cute.
  • Facebook User: Facebook User I think it might benefit you to read and listen to understand before responding.
• Facebook User: Ohio taxpayers are funding this kind of nonsense through EdChoice. Is it reasonable to believe that supernatural forces have any impact on human events in the context of continued scientific discovery to the contrary, the physical realities of life on Earth, and the dearth of empirical evidence across the entirety of human existence and recorded history to support such belief?
  • Facebook User: Facebook User $1.5 BILLION. To be exact this year alone!!!
• Facebook User: I was homeschooled and raised in Independent Fundamental Baptist churches. I was taught that it had never rained before the flood too.
  • Secular Education Association: Facebook User may we ask how that meshed with what you later learned about science, particularly the water cycle? Did you ever question the contradiction between what you were taught religiously and what science tells us? And how did that make you feel as a child? We’re genuinely curious about how children process these conflicting explanations.
  • Facebook User: Facebook User I was raised in a Florida Southern Baptist home, went to the church’s school for a good chunk of elementary school, and we never learned that. I mean, it’s just such a doozey it literally made me “guffah” when reading it here. Maybe they saved it for the already gullible teens?
  • Facebook User: Secular Education Association they tend to tell you that science is just wrong. I went to a private Christian school for elementary and they taught us how carbon dating was wrong and actually made fun of it as “laughable.” Said that cow bones had been varnished to look old and that the “scientists” said they were millions of years old. Ha ha HA! Silly scientists.

    I’ve known of homeschool kids who only learned on their 30s and 40s that men — not Adam, all men — don’t have one fewer rib than women. They had been taught this and were embarrassed that even when they got rid of the fundamentalism, they had been given such a poor education that they didn’t even know where to start with the disinformation and what to question.

  • Facebook User: Facebook User Christian people are insane
  • Facebook User: Facebook User Since the popularity of Answers in Genesis, that idea is a lot more prevalent now within the Southern Baptist and independent Christian church communities. I have definitely heard it in both and worked for the SBC in college.
• Facebook User: As a Christian Educator, the pedagogy for their program is unsupported by research or best practices in the field. Faith is formed almost entirely by parents/caregivers in the home. I would disagree with the premise of taking children out of public school for religious education anyway due to missing critical instructional time and causing division among students of many faiths, but it’s also not even good religious instruction. The method, curriculum, and minimally trained teachers are all a concern even just from a religious education standpoint.
  • Secular Education Association: Facebook User we agree wholeheartedly! May we have permission to republish your comment above but without any of your identifying information?
  • Facebook User: Secular Education Association Yes!
  • Facebook User: Facebook User well, they don’t actually miss any critical instructional time at all. They miss a recess and a lunch a week in which they eat their lunch. While they’re at life wise. Now, that’s not across-the-board, normal for every program. But that is what is highly suggested, or during another non core subject
  • Secular Education Association: Facebook User it’s “highly suggested” that the kids miss specials- as in Art, Music, Library, Gym, etc. NOT lunch and recess. Lunch and recess is actually the less preferable choice for LifeWise because, inevitably, less are kids attending.
  • Facebook User: Facebook User Unless they are going offsite, they are using taxpayer funded facilities during the school day. So very wrong!
  • Secular Education Association: Facebook User they are going offsite. BUT. In the middle of the school day and interrupting EVERYONES education. That’s the loophole they use to make this acceptable- going off school grounds. 🙄 but make no mistake- they are absolutely using taxpayer funded resources to facilitate this mess. Principals, superintendents, district lawyers, school board members, teachers, secretaries, attendance clerks, lunchroom workers, recess monitors, transportation coordinators… the list goes on.

    Who’s coordinating schedules? Tracking attendance? Managing departures and returns? Reviewing policies? Handling parent complaints? Addressing safety concerns? Dealing with the legal fallout? Those are PUBLIC SCHOOL employees, working on PUBLIC SCHOOL time, paid with PUBLIC SCHOOL dollars. And relying on the public education system to help sustain your religious program while supporting policies that undermine public education is some WILD work.

    But here we are.

  • Facebook User: Secular Education Association and it’s their way of creeping into the school system so they can later say that they have already been in the schools. They definately have an agenda. I truly believe parents should protest lifewise while they are on school property picking kids up
  • Facebook User: Secular Education Association i saw a likewise red bus parked in Alliance the other day at the old Ponderosa building. It was 1:30 in the afternoon.
  • Facebook User: Secular Education Association Also lunch and recess would be an opportune time for the LifeWise Children to spread the LifeWise message to other Children. Sort of “Mini Missionaries” if you will.
  • Facebook User: Facebook User A CHRISTIAN EDUCATOR raised specific concerns about LifeWise’s curriculum, teaching methods, instructor qualifications, and educational value. And your response was to dismiss concerns about instructional time while ignoring practically everything else she said… very telling.

    Art, music, physical education, library, lunch, and recess all matter. Calling something a “non-core subject” doesn’t make it expendable.
    And here’s what I find particularly interesting: when we raise concerns about LifeWise, you question our understanding of Christianity. When a Christian educator raises similar concerns, you avoid addressing the substance of her criticism. The facts don’t change depending on who presents them. Neither does the burden of defending LifeWise’s practices. So which of her actual concerns do you disagree with, and what evidence do you have to support your position? Because so far, you’ve done an impressive amount of defending LifeWise. You are absolutely entitled to disagree with us but you don’t get to decide whose criticism deserves to be taken seriously based on whether they publicly profess Christianity. LifeWise is not Christianity, and defending Christianity does not require defending LifeWise.

  • Facebook User: Why would it be acceptable to sanction outside influence to teach information that is (not only incorrect) but in opposition to what the curriculum supports and teaches?

    When the student goes to take a standardized test and they’ve been given conflicting information by likewise and by their teachers, what is the benefit?

• Facebook User: Oh this is gonna make Facebook User want to yeet things.
  • Facebook User: Facebook User Typing on desktop bc I threw my phone out the window. Once again, amateur volunteers have high jacked our students so they can be taught fairy tales, when they should be in class or at lunch with their friends.
  • Facebook User: Facebook User called it. The absolute disrespect and gall these assholes have.
• Facebook User: OMG this lesson is just plain stupid. So, lies are part of the protocol? Psst I know…they already are…ever since someone at a local mega church told my child that her parents were going to burn in HELL since we were not ‘saved’. BTW, my denomination highlights the part of the Bible that says we are already saved without the altar call created by MAN.
• Facebook User: Oh FFS! Working hard to create scientifically illiterate people. RIDICULOUS!
• Facebook User: What did the lions eat?
• Facebook User: Are there any non Christian religious programs that kids can get out of school to attend ? In German schools there is a choice for religion class depending on make up of student body. Catholic class, Lutheran class, Jewish class, Muslim class and an ethics class. Religion or not is a choice not an opportunity for one particular sect to prosylatize. Having choices is real freedom of religion
• Facebook User: And every deconstructed evangelical who spent their college years in “the prayer movement” immediately hears in the head that Misty Edwards song….”IN THE DAYS OF NOAH…..IT NEVER RAAAAAIIIINED BEFORE!”
• Facebook User: The people were never warned about it either. Moses never told them. Nor was he mocked for it… things they added
• Facebook User: They also think a guy rose from the dead days later, so … 😂
• Facebook User: Biblically speaking it says the world did not operate the way it does now, early on. And if we want to be critical of what science is being taught, y’all think our ancestors had feathers and 4 legs.
  • Facebook User: Facebook User science always has worked the way it does for 13.8 billion years.
  • Facebook User: Facebook User are you saying our ancestors made out of clay? 😂
  • Facebook User: Facebook User you do realize we’re made of the same elements that make up clay, right?
  • Facebook User: Facebook User zero evidence to support that claim by the way. You’re putting faith in alleged smart people’s guesses.
  • Facebook User: Facebook User oh bud, most of natural object share elements like oxygen, hydrogen. Question is what’s the composition. If you learn in school, you should know this.
    Clay is composed by inorganic material. We are composed by organic material. We may share atoms, but not molecule.
    You are the perfect example of why your religion fail your education.
  • Facebook User: Facebook User have you not met the scientific process? Learned it?
    Its not a guess.
  • Facebook User: Facebook User there are not enough fat crayons and stickers for this one.
  • Facebook User: Facebook User it’s not for him 🙂 He never get better.
• Facebook User: Matthew 22:29 KJVS
  Jesus answered and said unto them, Ye do err, not knowing the scriptures, nor the power of God.

  Genesis 2:4-6 KJVS
  These are the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created, in the day that the LORD God made the earth and the heavens, [5] And every plant of the field before it was in the earth, and every herb of the field before it grew: for the LORD God had not caused it to rain upon the earth, and there was not a man to till the ground. [6] But there went up a mist from the earth, and watered the whole face of the ground.

  You are making a claim that rain for first 1656 years of human history is a scientific fact, but that is not a provable claim. It is a supposition.

  The witnesses present described a water that came up from the ground.

  You don’t have to accept this as fact. But you also can’t prove the counterfactual.

  And based on your track record of observing evidence in the Bible, I’m not sure you are a reliable witness.

  • Facebook User: Facebook User the Earth is 4.54 billion years old. Moisture and rain is measurable in fossilized plants, animals, and geological formations going back hundreds millions of years if not billions.
    Evidence over fiction.
  • Facebook User: Facebook User
    The rocks date the fossils and the fossiles date the rocks.

    The geological pressure produced by Noah’s flood could just as reasonably account for the evidence you interpret as billions of years of time.

    The Grand Canyon was formed over millions of years and a little water OR a whole lot of water in about 3 months.

    But if you begin from the premise “God cannot exist,” I understand why you might think billions of years might have occured.

    I don’t need to argue the point to make my case above: Lifewise is presenting an alternative explination for the observable evidence and parents believe their children should have access to this information. All that is needed for the program to exist in my book.

  • Facebook User: Facebook User Pressure is not a clock: Unlike radioactive decay (which ticks away at a predictable, constant half-life), geological pressure depends on local tectonic forces, the weight of overlying sediment, and depth. It does not accumulate or release at a steady, measurable rate over time.
    High heat and pressure can actually reset or disrupt chemical and isotopic systems in rocks, making them harder to date accurately rather than easier.

    Maybe save understanding science to those who understand the basics.

    As for your god, science ignores it and so do I.

    Lifewise is presenting bullshit as fact.
    Parents who value education should be warned.

  • Facebook User: Facebook User “the witnesses present”? What witnesses?
• Facebook User: The only place in the Bible before the Noah story where it mentions rain, it says that there had been no rain DURING THE FIRST WEEK OF CREATION. That’s it. (Genesis 2:5)
• Facebook User: WTF?
• Facebook User: Teaching creationism during school hours but not in school.. ..time to stop it!
• Facebook User: This had better be a religious private school. If it’s a public school, we’re going to fight.
  • Facebook User: Facebook User this is happening during school hours but off site (most of the time). They lure kids in with treats.
    Lifewise Academy in 3 minutes- what Parents need to KNOW!

    https://youtu.be/g2ga7YHm9uU?si=LCE5t1SOw0gloleS

• Facebook User: If you dont follow Monte Mader and listen to her podcast, Flipping Tables, you shpuld.